Tiny Mittens

Not as tiny as the tiny sweaters... but my sister knit these for the little hands of my cold dear children.
Then I spent an hour exercising a little ADD, putting off a couple projects, playing with Fireworks (as I don't yet own Photoshop, sigh...) and ended up with this.

Why? It really serves no useful purpose, other than the simple joys I get when playing with anything creative. It really can be addicting. But then supper needed to be cooked, served, eaten, and cleaned up after... and then there was the little run to the ER for x-rays to see if 8 year old's ankle was broken... just a bad sprain, poor little guy. Thankfully, we have yet to require a cast for any broken bones around here. There was a toe incident, which only resulted in a little 'buddy taping', but that really doesn't count now, does it? And that would make 2 ER trips in 4 days- it's getting to be a bad habit... baby has pneumonia (and set a family temperature record, coming in at 105.9) and that has kinda slowed the knitting progress as there has been a lot of baby holding. I may have knit while nursing a wee one, but an active (and sicky-crabby) 13 month old is a different story- she likes to pull on needles... she pulled a needle out of the sock I brought with to work on... ugh... she's in bed now, I should be knitting.

Back to my sister's mitten gifting. So cool to have a sister who makes sweet things for my little people. She was teaching herself to do colorwork, with bulky, for small hands... why didn't I think of that? I taught myself to do colorwork doing this...

Celtic Cardigan from "Knitter's Stash, Favorite Patterns from America's Yarn Shops"

After I had spent a day learning to cast on, knit and purl, I figured I knew what I was doing so I ran out and bought some Red Heart yarn and cast on for my very first sweater. I didn't even have a garter ridge scarf under my belt... classic overachiever move. That sweater lies unfinished, just needs another sleeve, which I know wouldn't even take a week... but I've moved on to greater things, well, more distracting things, and definitely greater yarns, though the Red Heart served my beginner budget well. Now that I've shared that sad tale, I may get up the gumption to knit that sleeve that has plagued my mind with knitter's guilt for several years now. Cyber accountability... we'll see. It won't be this week, my husband's sleeves are much higher on the priority ladder. And they're calling me, right now, can you hear them?

happy knitting,
ali